Chapter 10 - WHAT NATHAN KNEW
Beatrice survived the fall.
She landed on a lower section of the roof and suffered several broken bones.
Police arrested her before she reached the hospital.
Charles underwent emergency surgery.
Doctors could not promise he would survive.
Olivia surrendered her weapon.
She was taken into custody without resistance.
Grace sat in an ambulance with Lily wrapped in a blanket.
The child refused to release her hand.
Nathan stood several feet away.
He was soaked from the rain.
Blood ran from a cut above his eyebrow.
Grace knew the danger was over.
But the truth was not.
Lily eventually fell asleep against her shoulder.
Jonah approached.
“Olivia wants to make a statement.”
Grace looked toward the police vehicle.
“Why?”
“She says she will confess to everything.”
Nathan shook his head.
“She’ll lie.”
Jonah studied him.
“She also says she has evidence against you.”
Grace felt Nathan stiffen.
Jonah continued.
“She claims you learned Grace was alive three years ago.”
“I already admitted that.”
“She claims you learned more than that.”
Nathan looked toward Grace.
His silence answered before his words did.
Grace handed Lily to a paramedic and stood.
“What else did you know?”
Nathan wiped rain from his face.
“Grace.”
“What else?”
He stared at the ground.
“Mercer contacted me.”
“When?”
“Three years after you disappeared.”
“What did he say?”
“He said the woman who died in the fire was another patient.”
Grace felt the old terror returning.
“He told you I was alive.”
“He demanded ten million dollars.”
“And what did you do?”
“I paid him.”
Grace took a step backward.
Nathan moved closer.
“I thought I was protecting Lily.”
“From her mother?”
“From the scandal.”
The honesty of the answer was more painful than another lie.
Nathan explained that Holloway Technologies had just secured a government contract.
If the public learned his supposedly dead wife was alive inside an illegal clinic, the company would collapse.
Thousands of employees could lose their jobs.
His lawyers advised him not to investigate.
Beatrice told him Grace was permanently damaged.
Olivia told him Lily no longer remembered her.
Nathan chose silence.
“You bought my prison,” Grace whispered.
“I hated myself every day.”
“But you still went to work.”
He had no answer.
“You still came home.”
Nathan began crying.
“You still tucked Lily into bed while I was being drugged.”
“I was a coward.”
Grace looked at the man she once loved.
For years, she had imagined seeing him again.
In some dreams, he rescued her.
In others, he apologized and everything became whole.
She finally understood there would be no version of the truth that restored their marriage.
Nathan had not created the conspiracy.
He had not placed the pills in her drinks.
He had not locked the clinic doors.
But when the truth reached him, he turned away.
That choice made every year afterward possible.
Lily woke and called for Grace.
Grace returned to the ambulance.
Nathan followed.
Lily reached for him.
Grace did not stop her.
Nathan knelt beside the child.
“I’m sorry.”
Lily touched the cut above his eye.
“Are you going away?”
Nathan looked at Grace.
“I don’t know.”
Jonah stepped beside him.
“I do.”
He held out a pair of handcuffs.
Nathan did not resist.
Lily began crying as Jonah led him toward the police car.
Grace held her daughter tightly.
Her tears fell into Lily’s hair.
Lily whispered the question no child should ever need to ask.
“Mommy, was Daddy the bad person?”
Grace watched Nathan disappear into the vehicle.
“He made a terrible choice.”
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“Does that make him bad?”
Grace did not know how to answer.
